Renew 2022 – veho ergo sum

Intro | Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6 | Day 7 (back to Rides)

Day 8: 2022.09.24

TL;DR

In email-speak (corporate? Or everywhere), TL;DR means “Too Long; Didn’t Read.” It’s the hipper way of saying “Executive Summary.” It’s the section you put at the top of a very long mail to provide a summary.

Well, in this case, I’m meaning something different: “Too Lazy; Didn’t Ride.” I am aiming for this to be a summary, but it may be longer form, hence the rebranding. You’ve been forewarned.

I woke up this morning with no intention of riding. Rather, I just wanted to sit down with a cup of coffee and look back.

This week’s renewal

My last week of renewal was a ton of fun. I accomplished every goal for the week: 450 miles of riding with 39K feet of climbing, collecting 136 new tiles. I got to do a ton of exploring. I got better at having backup plans. And I learned more about bike maintenance (specifically, all about tubeless tires). I got a lot more familiar with the Entiat area. I balanced my nutrition well to be able to sustain over hours of slow and relentless pedaling (7 spaghetti dinners + cheetos + zotz). And I know that the next thing I’m buying is a water filter.

The “coloring in” of the Entiat area over my 7 days of riding.

Day 1: surveying the ground to be covered in the days ahead

Day 2: way up the Entiat River

Day 3: just the forest service roads and me

Day 4: lunch with a view

Day 5: one last tile before sunset

Day 6: saving the highest for last (beautiful, but brrrrr)

Day 7: after six days of brown, it was wonderful to see green

This Year’s Renewal

I celebrate a successful last week. And then I take a look further back … over the last 10 months since my last renewal (visiting Karl and Marth in Carefree, AZ). I wrote a bunch of things down, and then tried to find the right summary phrase. Here’s where I landed:

Effort (more) Consolidated.

Life (more) Integrated.

Consolidated is defined as “combine (a number of things) into a single more effective or coherent whole.” My actions are less random. I can see a clearer path of contribution to more of my efforts. I thank James Clear and his “Atomic Habits” for the minute-by-minute, day-by-day element of this. Tracking 20 different habits is not stressful for me. It is, instead, both grounding and propelling. From stretching to reading to writing to connecting to creating, I am daily contributing minutely but meaningfully to my own master plan. And the aggregate of a year’s worth of daily habits is a sizeable accomplishment.

Integrated is defined as “with various parts or aspects linked or coordinated.” The focal point of this integration for the last year is The Upside, our house at Lake Chelan (named for the power of positive thinking 🙂). Here is everything that this house is being designed for:

Longer visits. Charu and I always said, “we prefer spending a weekend with people than spending an evening with people.” This house will enable more of these longer interactions that we prefer.
Reconnection to my East Coast Family. The first event is on the books for next summer is all of my seven siblings and in-laws coming out for a week.
Space for my job. When I need to work, I have an entirely separate structure (not a tree house, but not far from that either) to adjourn to. This will be the embodiment of “productive everywhere”, having as optimal of a set up as I have on Microsoft campus. Yes, including the 3 chairs (integration inception: Henry David Thoreau: “I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society.”).
It takes a village. Charu and I have been getting more involved in local community efforts. We see us directing more of our energy towards philanthropy in the years to come. And Mason & Chelan are smaller towns where we can really make a difference. This will pretty much be Charu and me going into business together. I can’t wait for that future.
Winter Solstice. My new winter solstice practice is all day in the workshop, in celebration of my Pop, whose favorite day was Dec 21 because “now the days start getting longer again.” I’ll have a full work shop out there and, building off of #4, I look forward to enabling community build opportunities there.
Water! Charu and I love the water. I’m not much into astrology, but I’m a Cancer and she’s a Pisces, so it seems to have gotten that right.

Now our builders just need to get The Upside completed so we can up our integration.

I’m fully renewed and looking forward to being “all in” for the year ahead!

Love to you all.

Day 0: 2022.09.16

Introduction

I’ve stopped calling my annual week away my “Retreat”. Now it’s my “Renew”. That’s to signal that I don’t need to rethink my approach anymore, as I’m loving where I’m heading (and who all I’m heading there with).

This is now a week to renew. Renew my energy, my focus, my commitment(s), my body … and my baldness (one time a year now … it’s a good thing).

Air travel is still quite a bit unpredictable, and for my Renew I need maximal predictability and minimal stress. So this year I’m driving to Entiat, using our apartment as base camp, and then every day exploring the network of forest service roads running through all the mountains around Entiat.

Goals for Renew 2022:

Bike: at least 5K elevation every day; at least 10 new tiles every day. Try to “color in” as much of Entiat as possible.
Write: Renew post every day; practicing new format where Strava is a subset of blog post. This removes the need for readers to be Strava subscribers.
Sleep: 9+ hours each night.
Drink: only one night of drinking (I’ll pick the night where I feel the most ahead 🙂)
Eat: conduct an experiment to definitively answer the deep life question: “Is spaghetti for dinner six straight days acceptable?”
TV: none
Games/Puzzles: none

“Before” shot of the tiles around Entiat

Day 1: 2022.09.17

Returning to the Scene of the Crime

Rule for day 1: no music. Tuneless drive; Budless bike; Speakerless apartment. Tuneless tune-in. This is to stimulate pondering by not allowing me to just fall into singing along. To everything (turn turn turn) there is a season … and music will return on day 2. (Yes, I just sung in my explanation of the no music rule.)

The ride title refers to the fact that I started my ride with a redo of the loop I did a couple months ago that Garmin robbed me of, so I never got the tiles. I’m not complaining. The ride was even better the second time around (because I wisely reversed direction to get the steeper part as a descent).

Lowlight of the day: mechanical at mile 8
Highlight of the day: finding an epic single-track shortcut in the most unexpected place
View of the day: seeing the Columbia, because that meant I climbed all the way from Entiat River over the peaks.
Explorer Tiles collected: 20

Photo story:

8 miles in, i had a good sealant spray (that’s a lot of spilled blood on the road) followed by a non-cooperative pump. I was worried I was going to have to call it short, but fixed the pump (turns out it needed to be tightened … why would one every want to loosen a pump?) and got the tire back to 95%. “Fix the bike; ride on.”

pretty typical surface for today; pretty typical view for today

This was the tighter and steeper road that I biked up last time. So glad I came down this one this time. I even got to practice my “drop seatpost simulation”, aka: my butt off the back of the saddle to lower my center of gravity to keep from endo’ing.

No Trespassing to the left. No Trespassing to the right. “None shall pass.”

I thought the summit was where the power lines were. It turns out I was _above_ the power lines.

Hike to a tile … and get a view of the Columbia behind me.

What a view! That’s the columbia below, with Sun Cove on the right and the “tunnel rock” on the left side of the Columbia, signaling the 97A climb to the tunnel.

Unfortunately this came out very dark. But this was my favorite discover of the day. A _gorgeous_ single track that also served as a terrific shortcut for me. Strava didn’t even know about this. Veloviewer is how I saw it. I’ve named this segment “Thank you to whoever created this awesomeness.”

Hubba Hubba. I couldn’t get enough of these views. Good thing I’m here all week!

There are the power lines below me … note the network of dirt roads below. It’s an explorer’s paradise.

260: Renew22, Day1: Returning to the Scene of the Crime | Ride | Strava

Day 2: 2022.09.18

Awesome Awaits Up the Entiat

Rule for day 2: maximum pavement. After a heavily dirt first day, I wanted to give my legs (and arms and shoulder) a little recovery time. After today, I should be fine with mostly dirt for the rest of the week.

I had ridden 25miles up the Entiat River. But I had never ventured all the way to where the pavement ends (36miles I think). I enjoyed the rural road and all the scenery along the way, but was blown away when I reached the end of pavement. You’ll see in the photo story below that my camera button broke … it just kept taking pictures! 😜

Lowlight of the day: no luck getting any decent wave streak going along Entiat River Road.
Highlight of the day: everybody that I talked to when I stopped was both pleasant and helpful, from the locals to the forest rangers. So I guess I should’ve restricted my wave streak attempts to the campground parking lots.
View of the day: every single inch of the singletracks I rode off of the Cottonwood and Entiat campgrounds.
Explorer Tiles collected: 17

Photo Story:

Spaghetti for the week was completed yesterday (after my Day 1 report, so I put it here). Cooking a week’s worth of spaghetti reminded me of the bulk cooking we did in college (though more like 3 days at a time). And it tasted a lot like the spaghetti I ate in college (translation: I miss Charu’s awesome bolognese!).

Foreshadowing of future rides, after our place at the lake is done.

One of two river crossings. As my water supply got low near the end, I was regretting not having a water filter. Purchase for next time!

The road reduced to one lane here because of the river that formed next to the road from the firefighting here a few years ago.

And here’s the start of the burn. You’ll see burn in the rest of the photos upriver from here.

The yellow road sign in the distance says “pavement ends”. Yay!!!

And shortly after the pavement ends, the road ends. Which leaves you with singletrack like this

I had to remind myself to watch the trail. Epic views!

Less than 10% of today’s ride was dirt. But it accounted for 90% of today’s bliss.

Loved seeing this road twist into the distance

Even the pavement was full of beautiful views.

261: Renew22.2: Awesome Awaits Up the Entiat | Ride | Strava

Day 3: 2022.09.19

Hooray for Backup Plans

Rule for day 3: keep pushing on. I wasn’t sure if the route I had laid out would get through, so I made a couple of backup routes … and I had them loaded on my Garmin. This was fortuitous because about 15mi in when I had just finished first 2K+ climb, the road I was supposed to take was completely overgrown. I spent 2min debating if I could push through it, and realized there was no way. 2min later, my route to Swakane was canceled and my route to Chumstick was loaded. And I was off!

Lowlight of the day: the descent to Mad River. This is the 2nd time I’ve made that descent (the first was with Tristan, David, and Joseph: Solstice (Observed) | Ride | Strava). It will also be my last.
Highlight of the day: being in the middle of nowhere! The backup route to Chumstick put me deep in the interior of this mountain range. The only sign of humanity was the network of forest service roads I was on.
View of the day: being high enough up to see the plateau on the East side of the Columbia. Unfortunately, my camera didn’t do this justice.
Explorer Tiles Collected: 18

Photo Story:

White cheddar jalapeño Cheetos are to this trek as Butt’r was to the Numb Nutz’s 2005 STP Trek. On the left is the portion size on ride #1. On the right is the portion size for ride #3 … and #4 … and #5 … and then I’m probably out.

Butt’r story: Mo’ Butt’r

Where the pavement ends … The party begins

The theme for the next set of photos is: keep climbing. This shot is from the first switchback above the Entiat River Valley that I started in.

There’s the valley, and on the right is the last section of dirt road I was on.

There’s the valley, and on the bottom right (in the trees) is the last section of dirt road I was on.

There’s the valley, and now you can see all the way to the Columbia River (depending on how good your eyes are)

Pano from an exposed switchback. You don’t notice all the climb involved because the views just keep getting grander.

New theme: tense! That’s looking across the valley to the ridge I biked on day #1 (past).

A look at Mills Canyon. Hopefully I’m covering the ridge on the other side for day #4 (future).

“Just then I saw a young hawk flyin’ and my soul began to rise”

It was getting more overgrown, such that I kept looking for tracks to make sure others had been through here.

THREE roads diverged … And I had no Frost poem to consult. Guess I’ll write my own for future reference …

Please GOD tell me that dirt path straight ahead is not the road I’m on.

You can _just barely_ make out the farmland on top of the plateau on the other side of the Columbia. It’s all tan, and it’s just below the smoke layer.

This is what it looks like when you think your slow phone has taken the picture already so you start to put it away … And then it snaps the photo. This _was_ a really gorgeous view of many of the parts of the road that I climbed to get here (elevation: 5500ft).

262: Renew22.3: Hooray for Backup Plans | Ride | Strava

Day 4: 2022.09.20

Puncture Massage and a Prayer

… and a little sense of urgency to not overly rely on divine intervention.

Rule for day 4: Get every tile, even if you have to walk. I had five planned hike-a-tiles on this one. And I throttled the distance to allow for more hiking time. Alas, a goof-up where I ignored my Garmin resulted in an extra 40min of backtracking to claim a missed tile. This put my water supply in jeopardy, so I had to skip hike-a-tile #3, #4, and #5. In retrospect, and speaking utilitarianly, I should have bailed on the backtracking.

Lowlight of the day: ignoring my Garmin. I do all this work to plan my routes. I have backup routes and everything. I plug them into the Garmin, and then head out on my way. So why in the world wouldn’t I heed Garmin’s persistent “off course” chirp?
Highlight of the day: let’s look back to the lowlight from day 1: my tire getting a puncture 8mi in. I remember thinking, “how do you know when all the sealant in the tire has been sprayed out?” Well, today I got my answer, 15mi from home and 3000 feet above the Columbia. One mile after declaring my ride over due to water shortage, I got another puncture in my front tire. I heard the sound, but didn’t see any white spray (my sealant is white). I pulled out the needle, spun the tire so that the puncture was on the bottom, then quickly rocked the tire back and forth. Still there was hissing. Plan B: plug the small hole with my finger so I can think. As I held it there, I could feel a bit of sealant collecting. I waited 15sec then removed my finger. Still a hiss, but smaller/quieter. I put my finger back, and started massaging the puncture, spreading the sealant around. Another 15sec, I removed my finger and there was no hissing. I rolled the tire in the dirt. No hiss. I put some weight on the handlebars and rolled the tire again. No hiss. I checked tire pressure. Definitely low, but a good ways from flat. Given the water situation, and the struggle I had with the pump on day #1, I opted for the “get your ass off the mountain now” approach. It was a slow descent while I attempted to favor the rear wheel, but it was a helluva lot faster than walking out. So why is this a highlight? Quick thinking and decisiveness avoided a very long walk at best, and a satellite SOS at worst. (Survey coming in Strava for my all my biking friends.)
View of the day: the picnic spot overlooking Wenatchee was incredible. I found myself not wanting to leave.
Explorer Tiles collected: 17

Photo Story:

The middle night of this Renew seems perfect as my one night of drinking.

Spent the first 10 miles rolling down 97A along the Columbia. This view never gets old (I say this after driving this road countless times over the last 30 years).

Here comes the pain train: one climb, 9.5mi long, 3800ft high. Bring it!

If you can read the fine print: e-bikes limited to motorized restrictions. I’m supportive!

First break up the hill, at the 1hr mark. I loved how much of the trail behind you could see in one frame.

Waaaay down below is the road I turned off of to start this climb. The 3800ft climb was bookended with 15% grade segments at the start and finish. I biked every inch of this climb. 💪

That about sums it up. Beautiful view. Relentless pitch.

This is earlier in the day when I was still remembering my plan for the day. 5 hike-a-tiles in the plan, and I would celebrate each one with a selfie holding up the # of that hike-a-tile. Yes, this is a setup.

Holy Wenatchee! What an overlook for the city. And the dam. And the island.

Picnic with a view. Stop #2 (of 2) on the climb. 2800 down; 1000 to go.

Heading more to the interior now. This ravine is where the climb starts … waaaay below, and out of sight.

A better view of the farms on the East side of the Columbia.

So my lens got frosty for the rest of the ride (and I was too oblivious to notice). But I’m keeping this photo for two reasons. 1: that’s Entiat below. If you know where to look, you can see our apt. 2: I’m supposed to be standing in front of the camera holding up 2 fingers. Because this is hike-a-tile #2. There is no hike-a-tile #3, #4, or #5. Water shortage had me calling it a _bit_ short.

263: Renew22.4: Puncture Massage and a Prayer | Ride | Strava

Day 5: 2022.09.21 (Happy Birthday, Pop!)

Eating From the Tree of Knowledge

Rule for day 5: get on the bike and ride! After sleeping on yesterday’s close call, and having extra time this morning to think about it as I took the bike to Trek, I was realizing that ignorance was indeed bliss. Once I realized how underprepared I’ve been, I started second guessing any remote ride. There’s a reason I’ve done all of my past explorations with other people … safety in numbers. It took me another 90 minutes after getting back from Trek to finally get my butt on the bike. But once I did, I was relaxed and ready.

Lowlight of the day: temporary paralysis from my sealant-less puncture yesterday. Even though I refilled the sealant and bought more repair supplies, my mind stayed stuck too long on the “what if” game.
Highlight of the day: keeping with my “simplify” theme that accompanies my Renews, while I was at Trek I ordered a second wheelset for my gravel bike. This means that in a matter of weeks I will be ready to donate both FeZ and Jack to charity. Life is getting simpler.
View of the day: the strawberry milk waiting in my fridge at the finish line. My trip to Trek meant I’d be driving by the grocery store. So more sunscreen, more cheetos, and my #1 recovery drink: strawberry milk.
Explorer tiles collected: 14

Photo story:

Purchased new tire repair supplies, a new pump, and a 2nd bag of Cheetos. Not pictured here: 2 spare tubes (doh, I _knew_ I forgot something!)

Leaving later in the day meant more direct sunlight. That made it a welcome surprise to see all the tree-covered parts of my 2hr climb.

So steep of a climb even the downhill part showed up red 😜

Of the two wrong turns I made today, this was not one of them.

This is the Entiat River Valley below. I’ve ridden part of that road every day this week. And right at the 90 degree curve in front of me is Cooper’s General Store, where’s I’ve gotten a fresh bottle of water every day … and some Zotz

I don’t recall wrecking today, but this photo definitely makes it look like something went terribly wrong

Okay, look at the smaller tree in the middle of the picture. Just above its tip, on the opposite ridge line, you’ll see a road do a switchback and then climb. That was the road I was on on Day 3.

Shade for all of the climb, and then views appeared at the very top.

A much better souvenir than the golf ball from Day 3.

Found the power lines yet again. And there’s smoke in the distant hills.

Shade on the way up. Shade on the way down.

See that gravel road in the middle of the ravine. That’s the cliff that I biked down on Day 3 and that my ccbc crew biked down two years ago. Two times too many.

One final tile claiming for the day, and just before the sun drops behind the ridge I just rode.

264: Renew22.5: Eating From the Tree of Knowledge | Ride | Strava

Day 6: 2022.09.22

Smoke and Fire

Rule for day 6: Emerge alive. Today’s route was full of backup plans, because today’s route was the deepest interior. I worked out the math such that the furthest walk I’d have was 10 miles downhill (backup route 1: back the way I came up; backup route 2: down to Mills Canyon; backup route 3: down to Cashmere; original plan: down Swakane). I took my time and played it very safe. Well, until “barn sour” kicked in on the way down Swakane. Smelling the finish line, and celebrating that I had done all the planned vertical and collected all the planned tiles, I was lighter on brakes and heavy on the bomb. A rough section came up and I started tracking the more technical elements. This drew my attention away from the farther ahead, such that there was increased “surprise potential”. Sure enough, as my eyes started to lift back up, there was a large rock with a washout after it, such that the rock was basically a ramp. My BMX days are far behind me, but I remembered enough to bring my weight back and start to lift the handlebars. Stuck the landing, spewing swear words and prayers in the same breath.

Surprise for day 6: after 40miles of dirt, I approached the end of the Swakane Canyon descent. All of the work was done, and now I just had to pedal a leisurely 10 flat miles back to Entiat. But what’s going on up on the hilltop in front of me? A whole bunch of fire trucks. How did they get up there? Scouting? Drills? I look down at the Canyon road and there’s another fire truck there. I stop and he tells me there’s a brush fire on the hill. Then he tells me I can continue. I round another bend and now I can see the fire, and the set of helicopters that are scooping water from the Columbia and dumping it on the fire. I snap a picture and round the final bend before Hwy 97A. There I see … no cars. I look down the highway and see a police road block a few miles away. I assume there is one in the other direction as well.

No authorities are at that intersection, and the last order I was given was by the firefighter up the hill saying I could continue. So I turned left and started biking north on 97A. I watched the helicopters and timed my crossing to not be when they were overhead. I reached the other roadblock and asked the officer there for the protocol so I could do it right next time. He thought I made a fine call and said, “you’re not on fire, so have a nice day.”

The next mile or so I was in news reporter mode, with drivers from the line of cars flagging me down and asking what was up. After doing that probably 10 times, enough of those drivers started turning around that I figured the rest of the folks could draw their own conclusions. I pedaled off.

Lowlight of the day: Moondust above Cashmere. I don’t know what else to call it. The forest ranger called it “very soft” when I hit something similar at Cottonwood Trail on Day2. This was from a logging operation that clearly saw so much heavy machinery that every curve on the road was a sand trap. But it didn’t look like sand. It took me some time to figure out how to spot it, and it was sketchy as heck to get through it. I figured out that the center of the road was the most “terra firma” and slowly advanced there.
Highlight of the day: Epic Ride Weather (ERW) App. I have been using this app every day (and long before this trip) to check out the weather, including wind (big deal out here). Today, it showed a significant change, with winds coming strong out of the West. I reversed my route to make the wind less of an impediment. I’ve lost count of how many time ERW has made my ride better.
View of the day: I have a winner and a runner up. The winner was the peak where I could see 180 degrees facing South. The runner up was all of the different forest service roads that I _recognized_ on my ride up. Six days of riding all over the mountains, and now I have such a better understanding of this entire area.
Tiles collected: 24

Photo Story:

Put all of this on my bike and in my pockets. Be prepared!

Been there, done that. And, apparently, doing it again. This is the first climb from Day 3, then I continue further up and over the ridge.

The last push to the ridge was a set of switchbacks, all of which you can see on the right. The lower path is the road I was on on Day 3.

Looking across at the network of roads on the far hillside, many of these were roads I did on Day 4.

A little Sound-of-Music-esque. No, I didn’t burst into song. Sorry Julie.

Okay, this is the peak. And this is a panorama of the view. The only downside: it was 54 degrees with unabated winds at around 25mph. I couldn’t take this pano quick enough!

Ha ha, look at this! It’s the 4-way intersection I encountered on Day 3. This time i’m covering the other two ways. See, Robert, you *can* make it back there again.

The trees were nice scenery … and great wind protection.

Moondust. This came and went over a 2mi stretch on the way down through the trees. It sure put a damper on what would otherwise have been a gorgeous drop.

One singletrack trail to pick up a tile at the top of Swakane Canyon.

Oh, wait, I guess that was fire I was smelling.

265: Renew22.6: Smoke and Fire | Ride | Strava

Day 7: 2022.09.23

Victory Lap

Rule for day 7: knock out a century. My retreats usually consist of consecutive days of centuries. With the exploration goal of this trip, I wasn’t expecting to hit centuries. But last night, after looking at the ground I’ve covered in the Entiat Hills (350 miles, 34.5K feet of climb, and 110 tiles), I dusted off my #1 word from my first retreat: “enough.” I looked at the map and felt very content with how much of Entiat I had “colored in.” So I laid out an “all pavement” century for today. Up to Chelan; down to Wenatchee; up to Entiat. Six crossings over four bodies of water (in order: The Chelan River; The Columbia River; The Wenatchee River; and the Entiat River).

Lowlight of the day: 97S between Chelan and Wenatchee. Lots of trucks. Not lots of shoulder. I pretty much knew this was going to be the case, but wanted to “one and done” this road. So now I have.
Highlight of the day: the predictability of pavement. No teeth rattling. No surprise ascents. No dead ends. Pavement exactly where it said it was going to be. There was a huge retread sitting just over the shoulder in the lane. I stopped and pulled it to the side of the road (Trash Negative). A mile up the road, I saw a dump truck on the shoulder … with one less tire. I stopped at the cab and had a brief but pleasant chat with the driver. I told her I had moved the carcass off the road, and then wished her a better rest of her day 😊.
View of the day: after crossing over BeeBee bridge, I stopped in the park to get a photo of the bridge. When I saw all the lush green, I took my shoes off and walked barefoot in beautiful green grass. After six days of brown and “dirty green”, it was wonderful to see real green. The power company that put the dam in downriver pays for all of these parks up the river, I’m pretty sure indefinitely. Win-win.
Explore Tiles collected: 24

Photo Story:

A very familiar view of the Columbia from 97A, en route to Chelan. Very familiar, but still very beautiful.

Navarre Coulee. My first climb of the day. I think I saw a total of five cars along this 7 mile stretch of road.

Looking down from Navarre at Lake Chelan. Our hour is just to the right of center on the far bank.

Lake Chelan is several hundred feet higher than the Columbia. This is the hwy dropping down from downtown Chelan to 97, which you can see following the curve of the Columbia on the right.

The Beebee bridge. My second biggest sprint of the day was hurrying my ass across this bridge. 😮

This guy loves waterfalls so much he built a huge one across the road from his house. I’m supportive.

Okay, confession. There was a 1/10th mile section of gravel I had to ride on to pick up a tile.

Whenever I could get off of 97S, I was rewarded.

This is passing Entiat, from the East bank of the Columbia. The hill seen here is what I climbed on Day 1. The power lines that I was talking about ending up _above_ can be seen coming off the hill on the right.

Another look at the Entiat hills from the opposite bank. Done. Done. Done.

The lower dark ridge on the right is what was on fire yesterday. And the canyon between the two dark faces is Swakane Canyon that I rode down. I told you I was right next to the fire.

Woah, they have dunes? I was too thirsty to stop and read the sign.

This is the pedestrian bridge I crossed to go from East Wenatchee to Wenatchee.

If you are ever within 30minutes of Wenatchee, you must go to OWL Soda Fountain.

And you must try their “muddy fizz” … or any other classic on their menu. Yes, Tim, I earned more Zotz today!!

2nd to the last water crossing. This is going over the Wenatchee River. No photo of the Entiat River crossing. That was 2mi from the finish line and I was running at full tilt.

My computer said 8 miles to home. 8 miles until i’m done with riding for the week. There is no tomorrow that I need to save anything for. This is when I turned on the afterburners. “Leave it all on the field.” I limped across the finish line. Success!

To the victor, go the spoils. Can I eat spaghetti for dinner 6 days straight? Yup … and tonight makes 7. There will be no 8 though as what’s on the plate is all that I had left. The Zotz and Cheetos were a lovely finishing touch.

266: Renew22.7: Victory Lap | Ride | Strava